THE SENATE QUEST FOR GREENIE RIGHTEOUSNESS

Before:

Amazingly, some Senate Republicans are seriously considering cosponsoring an amendment to the energy bill offered by Sen. Jeff Bingaman (D., N.M.), which incredibly almost got the backing of Energy Committee Chairman Sen. Pete Domenici (R., N.M.). This amendment seeks to tackle global warming by controlling and limiting the use of fossil fuels. Like Kyoto, it would set caps on energy use and set in place a vast bureaucracy to manage the new centrally planned economy. The amendment even assumes that jobs will be lost as a result, as it includes language aimed at increasing unemployment assistance.

So why on earth would Senate Republicans consider backing a growth-destroying, job-wrecking, welfare-creating measure? It cannot be because of its effect on global warming, as its effect would be unmeasurably small. The proposal is opposed vehemently by House Republicans, and as such if the Senate were to insist on the measure it would kill the energy bill outright. So the only plausible explanation is that it is being considered as a bargaining chip, to give the Senate conferees something to drop in exchange for the House dropping something the Senate doesn't like when the bill enters conference - most likely the liability protection the House bill gives to manufacturers of gasoline additive MTBE, now banned but once the darling of the environmental movement.

If this is what senators are thinking, it is the height of irresponsibility. Not only would Senate approval of the measure, even in the knowledge that it will never be enacted, establish the principle that Kyoto-like measures are acceptable to the U.S. Senate, but it gives the President's European foes a chance to wreck the Gleneagles agreement and to revive a dying Kyoto treaty that Europeans are currently helping to kill. Former British Foreign Secretary Nye Bevan famously said that the Labor party approving of unilateral nuclear disarmament would send him "naked into the conference chamber." It is no surprise that Democrats want to see an embarrassed president, but it is a galling sight to see leading Senate Republicans ready to tear the clothes off the president's back.



After (?)

Attempts to require US industries to cut carbon dioxide emissions as a way to address global warming appear to be headed for defeat in the Senate after a key Republican withdrew his support amid White House lobbying to keep greenhouse gas control programs voluntary. Senator Pete V. Domenici, the New Mexico Republican who chairs the Senate Energy Committee, had indicated he would support a proposal to cap industrial carbon dioxide emissions, an attempt to address climate change. That left environmental groups hopeful that the Senate would defy the Bush administration and for the first time force companies to cut the emissions, which many scientists have tied to global warming. But after meeting late last week with Vice President Dick Cheney -- and huddling Monday with about 10 GOP Senate colleagues -- Domenici opted out of supporting the amendment that was being prepared by his fellow New Mexico senator, Democrat Jeff Bingaman.

That meant Bingaman's amendment apparently lacks enough Republican votes to pass, and he is considering withdrawing it today. Another proposal with stricter emissions caps by Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, and Senator Joseph I. Lieberman, Democrat of Connecticut, will be voted on today, but it is widely expected to fail.

Democrats accused President Bush of blocking lawmakers from addressing what some scientists say is a leading cause of global warming. Senate minority leader Harry Reid said Bush and Cheney have convinced Republican senators to join them in bowing to energy companies. ''The White House is the administration of the oil companies," said Reid, a Nevada Democrat. Both President Bush and Vice President Cheney worked for oil companies, and it's obvious that global warming [legislation] is something the oil companies don't want."

Domenici said he chose not to support the amendment because he was concerned there wasn't a sensible way to enforce the caps, not because of White House lobbying. He said it would be unfair to require nuclear power plants, which are relatively clean, to cut their emissions as much as aging coal-burning plants, which are major producers of carbon dioxide. ''If everyone gets the same dose of medicine, it would never work," Domenici said. Domenici said he will hold hearings in the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee to work on what he said would be a fairer emissions-cap proposal.

Yesterday, the Senate voted 66-29 to expand tax credits and incentives for private-sector companies that find new ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The amendment, introduced by Senator Chuck Hagel, Republican of Nebraska, includes no mandatory caps and parallels existing Bush administration policies. It passed primarily with Republican votes. ''Innovation and technology are the building blocks for an effective and sustainable climate policy," Hagel said. ''There are viable policy options for protecting the environment without sacrificing economic performance in the manufacturing and other sectors.".....




RANCHERS GET A BREAK

For 70 years, the federal government has regulated - or tried to, anyway - the cow herds that graze across millions of acres of public land in the West. It's been a political struggle between preserving a rural way of life that epitomizes the nation's mythical pioneering history, supporting a slice of a regional economy that's dwindled in comparison to recreation and high-tech corridors, and responding to a growing environmental ethic that cares more about watersheds and biodiversity. As it has done with other social and economic sectors dealing with natural resources, such as mining, oil drilling, and logging, the Bush administration is tugging that difficult balance back toward ranchers.

The just-issued federal lands regulations make it easier for cowboys to go about their business. The new rules give ranchers more time, up to five years, to reduce the size of their herds if the cattle are damaging the environment, as well as shared ownership in the water rights and some structures on federal land. The regulations also lessen the current requirements for public input in deciding grazing issues. Government officials say they're simply "adjusting rather than conducting a major overhaul" of such regulations. Left in place will be the $1.79 per month that ranchers pay to graze a cow and its calf, a horse, or five sheep on federal land.

Kathleen Clarke, director of the US Bureau of Land Management (BLM), which oversees 261 million acres of federal land in the West, says the new regulations "will produce long-term rangeland health benefits." These include more vegetation along stream banks, which will reduce soil erosion and provide more wildlife habitat, says Ms. Clarke. This is in line with claims of representatives of the beef cattle industry, who assert that cows are good for the land.

But environmentalists point to government reports over the years showing that federal lands have been degraded where cattle roam, and they say the losers are wildlife, water quality, and the condition of the fragile arid Western range that supports them. "Almost nothing in these rules benefits the public lands or the millions of Americans who use them for purposes other than raising cattle," says Tom Lustig, senior counsel for the National Wildlife Federation.

Other critics note that, like the logging of timber on federal lands, the federal grazing program is a money loser for Uncle Sam. That may be true, comes the rebuttal, but help for Western ranchers - even though they produce a very small fraction of US beef - sustains rural communities and a way of life that's worth preserving in the face of residential subdivisions and strip malls.

Meanwhile, some government biologists say the administration is fiddling with the science of range management - mainly biology and hydrology - in order to promote its pro-ranching agenda.

An internal report by BLM scientists warned that the proposed regulations would be bad for the environment. "The cumulative effects ... will be significant and adverse for wildlife and biological diversity in the long-term," the scientists wrote. "The numbers of special status species [those listed or proposed for listing under the Endangered Species Act] will continue to increase in the future under this alternative." That language was removed from the scientific analysis that accompanied the new grazing regulations. As first reported in the Los Angeles Times, two scientists involved in the original analysis - both now retired - complained that their work had been "watered down."

Some observers note government efforts to help cattle ranching come at a time when those same agencies - principally the BLM - have been trying to reduce the number of another iconic animal: wild horses. Descended from domestic stock (some from as far back as Spanish explorers), such horses actually are feral rather than truly wild, and they do compete with cattle for forage and water in the Great Basin and other parts of the West. Until recently, the BLM was allowing them to be sold for slaughter and export as horsemeat.

BLM director Kathleen Clarke notes that "grazing is a proud heritage of the West." Ever since passage of the Taylor Grazing Act in 1934 - the first governmental effort to regulate cattle ranching on federal public lands - how to maintain that heritage without destroying the resource on which it is based has been a continuing political struggle.

Source






GREENIE PRATFALL

The EU failed to cut emissions because it was COLDER. But isn't it supposed to be getting WARMER?

"Emissions of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide rose in the European Union by 1.5% in 2003 after falling in 2002, the European Environment Agency reports. Italy, Finland and the UK were named as the worst offenders while cold weather was blamed for a rise in the use of fossil fuels to heat homes and offices.

Some commentators now doubt the EU can meet its promise to cut emissions by 8% of 1990 levels by 2012. A spokesman for Friends of the Earth called the new figures "shocking". "The blame goes mostly to national economy and industry ministers, who constantly block any attempts to introduce mandatory targets for renewable energies, energy efficiency rules or fuel consumption standards for cars," Jan Kowalzig said. Carbon dioxide emissions have risen by 3.4% since 1990, according to the EEA figures. The Copenhagen-based EEA said emissions in the 15 old EU member states increased by 53 million tonnes, or 1.3%, in 2003, after a drop in 2002. According to its figures, between 2002 and 2003, Italy, Finland and the UK saw the largest emission increases in absolute terms - 15m tonnes, 8m tonnes and 7m tonnes respectively. EU Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas called on member-states to meet their commitments.

Source





GLOBAL WARMING STRIKES AGAIN (?)

80 degrees F in a NYC summer! Wow!

An attempt to raise the world's largest ice pop in a city square ended with a scene straight out of a disaster film - but much stickier. The 25-foot-tall, 17 1/2-ton treat of frozen Snapple juice melted faster than expected Tuesday, flooding Union Square in downtown Manhattan with kiwi-strawberry-flavored fluid that sent pedestrians scurrying for higher ground. Firefighters closed off several streets and used hoses to wash away the sugary goo. Some passers-by slipped in the puddles, but no serious injuries were reported.

Snapple had been trying to promote a new line of frozen treats by setting a record for the world's largest ice pop, but called off the stunt before it was pulled fully upright by a construction crane. Officials said they were worried the thing would collapse in the 80-degree, first-day-of-summer heat. "We planned for this. ... We just didn't expect for it to happen so fast," said Snapple spokeswoman Lauren Radcliffe. She said the company would offer to pay the city for the cleanup costs.

More here

***************************************

Many people would like to be kind to others so Leftists exploit that with their nonsense about equality. Most people want a clean, green environment so Greenies exploit that by inventing all sorts of far-fetched threats to the environment. But for both, the real motive is to promote themselves as wiser and better than everyone else, truth regardless.

Global warming has taken the place of Communism as an absurdity that "liberals" will defend to the death regardless of the evidence showing its folly. Evidence never has mattered to real Leftists

Comments? Email me here. My Home Page is here or here. For times when blogger.com is playing up, there are mirrors of this site here and here.

*****************************************